Updown

"Updown" (stylised in lowercase) is a hyperpop song single by Piri & Tommy Villiers. Released on 17 February 2023 on Polydor Records, the song is about Piri having cowgirl sex with Villiers, and received broadly positive critical reception.

Background
On 11 January 2023, Clash reported that Piri and Tommy Villiers had split up, but remained friends, would release previously recorded music, and planned to work together in the future. They then featured on MJ Cole's "Feel It", which was credited to "MJ Cole ft. Piri & Tommy Villiers", and on 17 February 2023, they released the hyperpop song "Updown", which was credited to "Piri & Tommy Villiers". The song was written about having cowgirl sex with Villiers; Piri told Danny Howard's Radio 1 Dance Party that she had written it about a year earlier, and that it had a "really fast [...] four-to-the-floor beat". It is the first Piri & Tommy release she has a production credit on; part of the song's chorus, "I take it updown updown updown updown", was made after she accidentally copied and pasted her vocals. The song features a "Crazy Frog drop" at the end; she told Capital Dance upon its release that Villiers had added it during preparation for Piri & Tommy live sets, as he wanted it to "pop off extra hard[, ...] then we loved it so much we kept it in the full thing".

Reception
Upon release, BBC Radio 1 announced it as that day's "Hottest Record". In a review of the single when it came out, Onestowatch.com described it as a "raunchy hyperpop anthem" and an "electrifying declaration for anyone who has felt empowered by having someone at their mercy with the mere witness of their silhouette", and Clash Music described it as "glossy return that shifts from breaks-laden percussion through to a hyper-pop template" and "a dose of rave-fuelled female empowerment [featuring] a biting vocal from piri and some daring production elements". Attack The Culture noted that "this feels like it could have been a New Year’s Eve party anthem" and described it as an "audio gem", while The Official Charts Company described the song as "Charli XCX-esque".

Reviewing a performance of a November 2022 Froge.tour set, Izzy Morris of LeftLion described "Updown" as a record where "the pair play around with stylistic auto tune" and complimented Piri's "exploration of her 'hyperpop era'". However, upon release, she wrote a more mixed review for Impact Nottingham; while she found the track "perfectly built for a dancefloor, with the catchy, glitchy repetitive ‘updown’ in the chorus, summoning your head to move up and down with it", she was disconcerted by the lyrics, noting that "when you peer closer into [them], there’s something a little uncomfortable; Piri compares herself to other girls that aren’t willing to ‘put the work in’, but that she is different because she’s willing to ‘set the motion’ for her partner", that "[t]his otherwise infectiously dance worthy track is somewhat let down by this evident internalised misogyny", and gave it 2.5 stars out of 5.

Music video and other uses
A music video for the song was released on 2 March 2023. Directed by Ayla Spaans, the video depicts Piri singing, dancing, and pole dancing to the song. Towards the end of the song, the director and her two dancers turn into frogs. Villiers does not feature in the video; at the time, Piri and Villiers needed space. On 27 May 2023, Piri performed the song at Radio 1 Big Weekend.

Personnel

 * Piri – vocals
 * Tommy Villiers – production, mixing
 * Cass Irvine – mastering